


The Casting of Sins

by LogosMinusPity



Series: On the Supplication of Unwilling Penitents [2]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: BDSM, F/F, Knifeplay, Unhealthy Relationships, and riven likes it, katarina yet again shows that she's a sadist, katariven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-13
Updated: 2014-04-13
Packaged: 2018-01-19 04:33:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1455499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LogosMinusPity/pseuds/LogosMinusPity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Katarina does, indeed, ultimately get what she wants.  Content note for BDSM.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Casting of Sins

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thegadgetfish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegadgetfish/gifts).



> This is, of course, dedicated to [thegadgetfish](http://thegadgetfish.tumblr.com/), who I think has single-handedly made katariven a thing in the League fandom--I hope you enjoy this little gift!
> 
> I would also like to take a moment to bow my head very, very deeply to my beta, [Zerrat](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Zerrat), without whom, this story would have been a fraction of what it is. 
> 
> To all others, I hope you enjoy~

For a long while afterward, Riven consoles herself in the rage. 

The memories of an impromptu meeting in a dusty wayside inn roil at the forefront of her mind, fresh tinder.  There is the chagrin, disgust...the tug of unbiased loathing..but chief amongst it all is the fury.

It burns through her veins and gives fire to her motions on the Fields of Justice. 

It is only venting outrage...or at least that is what she tells herself.

But as the days and weeks meld into months, she cannot find even a semblance of peace.  Her mind and body alike are restless with an unnamed driving force, and all she knows is that Katarina Du Couteau, the infamous Sinister Blade, is the source.

Riven does not go out of her way to avoid the Noxian assassin anymore than she tries to seek her out; their paths do not cross frequently, but when they do, Riven can feel her blood burn like oil taken to open flame.  It is white-hot and consuming, until even sighting the distinctive wash of red hair makes Riven’s knuckles grow white for how tightly she clenches her sword hilt.

The sheer...situation of it all.

It is verging on impossible to focus.  Riven finds that she can hardly keep her composure.  She forgets what she is trying to do, who she is trying to be.  The countless years of self-imposed exile and endless wandering have exacted their payment—sleepless nights filled with circular ruminations, dark questions that beg only darker answers.  She has through pushed them, always, and paid her tolls.  Yet now her thoughts are ever focused elsewhere.  The past, the words spoken to her in that dusthole of a hovel...but mostly her thoughts revolve back around to the woman who spoke those things.  And the more she pushes against it, the more it returns the favor back, and all too many nights are spent waiting for dawn.

Katarina is a catalyst for whatever near-sickness is it that gnaws away at her now.  Not once since her self-imposed exile has anyone made her stop and stutter in purpose and drive.  Not until now.

It is only when the situation becomes truly unbearable to her—for she is certain she cannot stand to even hear of Katarina second hand—that Riven finally acts, consequences be damned.

Unauthorized fights have never been allowed within the Institute of War, but Riven no longer cares.  Besides, when her blade come whipping through the air, there are no bystanders to run and tell the heads of the Institute; it is only her and Katarina, and the assassin is nothing if not one to hold her tongue.

Her twin daggers are out in a twinkling flash.  Riven’s broken rune blade careens violently down onto the x-form defense that the daggers make, and she doesn’t miss the assassin’s grunt of exertion from the concussive clash.

Riven gives a low growl of irritation.  It is too much to hope for a lucky first hit.

The blow is abandoned, and she follows with a sharp upper slash.  That, too, is deflected, and now her rage begins to surface.  Though no counterattack is yet to be launched, Riven cannot land a successful hit.  Each swing and strike is dodged, blocked, or deflected, and a certain desperate fury begins to overwhelm her usually impeccable control.

She bellows, a wordless sound of wrath.  Her swings become steadily wilder.  They lack the focus and precision that has always made her strength so formidable, and instead are consumed with reckless abandon, with a simple and desperate desire to just _land a blow_.

Riven catches a glimpse of Katarina’s eyes widening, realization of some degree striking her before they narrow into cunning and conniving slits of green.

Riven yells out and throws another heavy swing, one that would cleave the woman in half if it managed to hit.  Her target expertly dodges the blow, and suddenly she is inside Riven’s guard, and there is nothing the warrior can do.

The edge of one curved and wicked blade is pressed up against her neck.  The dagger could slit her throat before she could so much as bat a lash.  The blade, however, holds.

Katarina leans in closer.  Her breath smells of honeyed cloves and the promise of dark violence.  Riven feels the metal just barely slice into her skin, and the blood slowly run down her neck.

“Enough of charades and masks, Exile—they ill-suit you.  When you are finished wearing them, you know where to find me.”

Then she is walking away, back fully and confidently turned as her flaming hair billows out behind her.  Her presence is gone, and Riven nearly staggers forward, one hand clasped to her neck to staunch and hide the paltry flow of blood.

It is only once the Noxian assassin has long since disappeared that Riven finally moves.

She roars—in anger, in helpless frustration—and though her broken blade is but a fraction of the massive sword it once was, the reckless impact of it still shatters and fissures the ground at her feet.

 

* * *

 

Days have passed, and Riven’s fingers run over the thin but rough scab on her neck, pulling at the tight skin.

She is in front of a tall and sturdy wooden door, in one of the separate and private wings of the Institute, a long walk from her own humble quarters.  The black oaken planks are thick, bound with shining brass.  All of it lends to the silently imposing aura, nevermind that it is but dead tree and ore.

While there is no nameplate to be seen, the door hardly needs one; Riven knows precisely where she stands...she simply cannot for the life of her discern _why_.

A pitch torch hanging from the nearby wall flickers and spits, drawing her gaze, if only for a moment.  Then her eyes return back to the door—the problem—and to the scar-decorated fist that still hovers over it.  She sighs quietly, and it is a mix of consternation and grievance.  She loosens her fist, begins to drop her arm, but then just as quickly it tightens and inches toward the wood for the hundredth time.

The night has only grown longer in the many minutes she has silently stood at the threshold.  Indecision, once so foreign to her, is now a plague.  She wants to cluck her tongue in self-directed disgust, and to turn heel.  Her feet, however, seem to have taken root.  She remains standing, eyes still fixed onto the fine and nearly imperceptible grains of stained wood.

The torch hisses again.

Riven starts the cycle of pulling her arm back, but instead a brief flicker of stubborn resolve alights through her—she has taken the time and effort now, and for what?—and her knuckles strike against wood. 

Her arm falls to her side and the door opens a scant few seconds later. 

Katarina’s skin nearly glows in the torchlight.  Her hair shines, and the telltale scar that bisects one eye seems more cloaked in shadow than usual.

Riven realizes that her mouth is already half open, but she has not the faintest clue of what she is supposed to say.

Katarina, fortunately, does not seem the least bit perturbed.  In fact, she does not even seem remotely surprised as to why Riven has come knocking at her door during the late hours of the night.  The assassin is still dressed in her typical work leathers, and appears quite at ease.  But then, why wouldn’t she?

One eyebrow rises, and then she gestures into her room.  Before Riven can even speak, Katarina is already turning back into her quarters, leaving the door open behind her.  A silent invitation.

Riven halts.  For a moment her mind still screams at her that she has come all this way without even her sword at her side, that she is entering a _master_ _assassin’s_ chambers.  The thoughts fade as soon as one foot steps over the threshold, and door closes shortly thereafter.

Particularly when compared to her own spartan living conditions, Katarina’s quarters are lavish.  Hardly gaudy—the racks of well kept weapons and mannequins of leather armor are nothing if not functional in purpose—but the the bedroom is as appropriately fitted as expected for a Du Couteau.  Lavish rugs, wall tapestries, a canopied bed…

Riven’s eyes jump over the lush crimson hangings on the posted bed, and she jerks her head back toward to where Katarina stands by a small table.  Polished pewter goblets are in either hand, and an open bottle sits on the mahogany.  When proffered, Riven accepts one.  It is filled with a generous pouring of a red liquid so dark it is nearly black.  It could be poisoned, for all she knows.

Nonetheless, when Katarina quirks her head in a silent toast, she empties the full contents down her throat.

The wine is sharp, full of flavor, and a clear Noxian vintage that likely cost a hundred gold crowns just for the bottle.  Riven barely savors it.  She _does_ savor the severe and sudden heat when it singes into her stomach.  It burns away the last of her hesitation, absolves her of the denial that has ghosted her for weeks on end.

Her empty goblet is nearly slammed atop the table.  It is an unspoken challenge, and as she waits for a response, she glares into the hypnotic and unreadable green eyes of her opponent.

Katarina smirks.  Condescending amusement floods her features.  She sips her own wine once, twice, a pace far more befitting of such an expensive beverage.

Then she sets her drink down.

Riven clenches her jaw when Katarina reaches out, and one slender finger begins drawing nameless patterns on her collarbone.  Her blood feels near to boiling now, but not from anger.  Not this time.

“So tense, Exile.  Try to relax.”  The suggestion is spoken in a wanton drawl. “You did come here for a reason after all...didn’t you?”

The final word is punctuated with a sudden and hard shove to her sternum, and Riven stumbles backward.  She quickly rebalances herself, and when she looks up Katarina has closed the distance.  They assassin draws herself up to her full height, and though she is not _that_ much taller, she seems to loom like a sinister shadow.  Riven’s lungs lock for a moment, and she forgets herself.  She leans backward, takes another step in retreat, and finds her spine up against one corner post of the bed.

Her first response is to bring her hands up, but as soon as she does, her wrists are snatched, yanked up by Katarina and pulled above her head.  Riven knows that she is the stronger of the two, but something else catches her hands and refuses to give.

The effort of craning gaze upward strains her neck, but Riven sees that her wrists are now neatly bound, caught up in a white, braided rope.  She is, for a very long second, disbelieving.  

At least until Katarina takes a few steps backward. 

Her lips are pursed, her arms thoughtfully crossed.

“Much improved.”

And Riven can tell by the husky tone that this is certainly the case.

She strains against the ropes, muscles rippling.  The knots only dug further against her wrists, even tighter than before.

“Now, now,” cautions Katarina.  Her back is now turned and her hands are busied with something at the table that Riven cannot see, no matter how she twists and pulls.  She catches a glimpse of the pale profile and glinting, poisonous green eyes. “Those are made from highest quality Ionian silk thread.  They will hardly rip or tear, even before someone with such...impressive physique.  Of that you can be certain.”

There is no point in continuing to pull.  Riven resigns herself, but holds back the sigh from her lips.  She is a far cry from being at ease, now caught prey to whatever mercies may or may not be shown to her.  The thought sends a thrill of fear and anticipation alike running through her abdomen, but instead she continues to quietly glare.  She _cannot_ afford to show weakness.

“And just what do you…”  Riven trails off when Katarina returns with her goblet in hand, fully refilled.

“Drink.”

When Riven hesitates, she finds a dagger pressed against her bottom lip.  With just the lightest pressure, flesh splits, no different than if she had been slugged in the face.  A hot shudder runs through her when Katarina licks the end of the dagger before resheathing it.

“Drink.”

It is a command; the goblet is forced in between her lips.  Wine pours into Riven’s mouth, but Katarina tilts it too quickly to be swallowed.  The wine spills over her tongue, stings into her cut lip.  It dribbles down her chin and onto her tunic in an array of diluted blood.

“How barbaric your exile has made you, Riven,” chides Katarina.  Her perfectly white teeth show, and she sneers in cruel desire. “You’ve gone and made a mess of yourself.”

Then she throws the goblet to the floor.  The pewter clangs loudly against the tiles.

Just as quickly, Katarina snakes forward, licks the blood and wine alike from Riven’s chin.  Riven fails to suppress her shudder, or the curl of throbbing heat that comes undone in her stomach.  She gasps when teeth bite down onto her lower lip, and droplets of blood well up.

Kat pulls back and licks her lips, and her eyes are dark with want. “Time to clean you up.”

She crouches down, pulling out more silken rope from beneath the bed.

Riven grits her teeth and looks straight ahead, even as she feels similar silken loops being tied around each ankle, forcing her legs apart just so.

Once finished, Katarina turns back toward the table.  She opens a small and thin case, and turns so that Riven can fully see the contents.  They are a set of silver plated daggers, too thin and elegant to be designed for field work.

Their purpose is easily discernable; Riven is caught between the delicious heat that ripples through her and the instinct to strain against bindings anew.  Muscles cord outward even as she shivers, but it is useless.  She is here, and she is trapped.

Satisfied, Katarina gently sets the box down.  She returns in a few languid and predatory steps, and holds something up in one hand.  It is a length of cloth, and as soon as it is raised toward her head, Riven realizes that it is a blindfold.

She instinctively jerks her head back, but there is nowhere to go.  The length of black cloth is pulled over her head and hair.  The final thing she sees before the it covers her eyes is the winking edges of the set of blades, like tiny mirrors in the satin casing.

Her world goes dark then. 

“Mmm…”

Though she is blinded, her other senses only hone themselves further.  She can hear the murmur of pensive thought from Katarina, the slow and ponderous footsteps, and the tapping of a slender finger against thin, carbon-folded steel.

Riven has no choice but to wait, a growing sense of anxious expectation making her breath hitch.  Her shoulders already ache from the bindings that pull them up; her joints and tendons alike grow stiffer with each passing second; her heart starts to pound, and she knows that Katarina can sense it all.

She doesn’t have to wait long.

Even with the blindfold, Riven can tell when the other woman hovers close.  She can feel the heat rolling off of foreign skin, and she swallows thickly.

The collar of her tunic is grabbed in one hand, and she hears the familiar, whispering sigh as the cloth gives way to the edge of a knife.

Quickly, methodically, Riven is stripped of what clothing she wears, canvas and linen peeled away like the rind from a fruit until she is bare, restrained for Katarina’s viewing pleasure.  A full body shiver runs from toe to crown and back down again.

The knife returns against her soon enough, but it is testing and light.  It dances along her skin, scraping.  There is not enough pressure to cut skin, not quite yet, but the touch is still threatening.  All too quickly she becomes hypersensitive.  She cannot see, but she is acutely aware of the curious and meandering path in which Katarina drags her dagger.  She sucks in a lungful of air when the edge of the blade almost casually nicks across her hip; she jerks and strains when it pricks at both of her taut nipples.  The pattern continues, steel slowly running over her exposed skin like a third, unrepentant hand.

By the time the knife finally pulls back, Riven is shivering all over, ripples shuddering across her skin like a fly-stung horse, muscles twitching at even the hint of a touch.  Her breath comes in heavy gulps.

In space of an instant, Katarina is pressed against her side, and her breath tickles in Riven’s ear.

“Where shall we start, then?” The question is a twilight whisper.

Katarina takes an earlobe into her mouth.  She bites down, and Riven can only partially stifle a moan.

“Hmmm?”

When Riven doesn’t answer, the lips work their way down her neck toward the fading scab from days earlier.  Teeth nip at the fresh and slender scar tissue.

Words aren’t needed for her to know that Katarina has found her answer.

A moment later and the warmth of a mouth is replaced by the stinging edge of steel, bringing the wound back to full and bleeding life.  Riven cannot stop the tremble that takes her, not as her mouth is covered in a searing kiss.

Nails run down her back then across her front, purposefully inflaming every last nick and cut until Riven is quivering and grasping vainly at empty air with her hands.

When Katarina parts from the kiss, Riven groans at the lack of contact.  She groans even further when she feels the other women drop down to the floor.  A low chuckle reverberates from between her legs, and Katarina’s breath is hot and heavy.

Cold steel is placed against her skin yet again.

“Try not to move too much.”

The warning is barely uttered, and the tip of the knife immediately goes to work on her inner thigh.  No different than before, the cuts are shallow, barely inflicting injury.  Yet the skin parts just as easily, and Riven does not have to wait long until the familiar and warm trickle of blood begins running down her leg.

She struggles not to squirm...not at the hot and wet laughter between her legs, nor at the intricate sigil she can so acutely feel being carved into her skin.  Perhaps it is the Du Couteau coat of arms, perhaps it is Katarina’s own symbol, perhaps it is even a meaningless scrawl, but Riven knows the inking of this mark is carefully deliberate.

Each second seems to stretch into an hour, and it is only after an eternity that the blistering pain begins to ease.  There is a soft clatter as the knife is placed onto the floor.  Then Katarina has replaced the touch of metal with her lips, going back over every last inflamed line that she has patterned into flesh.

The quivering ripples continue echoing across her spine, even when the exquisite torture stops.  Already her mind is adrift, scattered into too many pieces to even begin summoning coherent words.  Blinded, ensnared, her every last thought and sense revolves about the woman below her, about what she might only do next.

There is a moment to hear Katarina’s hum.  The assassin is clearly pleased with her handiwork, but before Riven can even think…

Her entire body jerks as that demandingly soft mouth presses against her clit.  She strains into it, but the silk is a tormenting captor, holding her back.  Katarina’s second, deeper laugh vibrates up through Riven’s pelvis.  Her tongue continues to paint unrelenting and unhurried patterns, in turn drawing out quaking gasps and shudders from Riven.

It is only the last vestige of control that lets her bite down, choke back on the instinctive plea.  She will not beg from anyone, least of all the woman before her.

Katarina seems to sense the proud defiance, and Riven can _feel_ the smile on heated flesh.  A hand grips her thigh, digs into the red and newly cut skin there.

“ _Ah!_ ” The stinging and raw burn jolts through Riven, and she cries out against it.

The grasp keeps her hips steady—not that the ropes would let her move aught else—and she can do nothing but knot her muscles and arch her back, curl her fingers and bite down on her lips, breaking open the barely clotted cut.

Every tendon seems to seize at once, and the wave of longing that engulfs her drowns out the world.  What word she expends on her breath, she doesn’t know, but whiteness briefly blinds her before fading back into black.

Riven sags against her bonds.  She feels emotionally devoid...and satiated.  It is a feeling that has so long eluded her, it now seems almost foreign.

A firm touch to her chin tilts her head upward.  A hand reaches around to the back of her head.

“Wha…”

Her words die off when the blindfold falls away.

Riven blinks rapidly, and her eyes water anew at how bright the candlelight seems.  Once they clear, she quickly focuses on the only sight worth seeing in the whole of the room.

Katarina is gloriously nude, and when exactly she chose to divest herself of clothing, Riven is not certain.  She has a body that any woman would envy, and Riven licks her dry and coppery lips when the master assassin stoops down to undo the ankle bindings.

As she straightens, she catches Riven’s gaze, and she smirks.  One auburn eyebrow rises in silent challenge, and when she reaches up to untie the ropes around Riven’s wrists, she pushes her front flush against Riven’s.  Her breasts are firm and soft and supple, and it is hard for Riven to not remember how perfectly they fit into her hands before her mouth and thoughts alike are claimed with another scalding kiss.

She does not bite—not this time, at least—but her kiss is no less demanding than before, and Riven tastes herself in it.

Katarina finally pulls away, and Riven feels her arms drop free at last.

With the bonds undone, though, she stumbles and almost falls.  The subsequent hand she runs through her loosely bound hair does little to reclaim any logic to her jumbled thoughts.

Katarina grabs her shoulder.  Her steadying touch helps Riven to keep balanced, from stumbling a second time.  Just as quickly, though, the grip shifts, becoming forceful and domineering.  It pushes down on her shoulder, urging her knees to bend and give way. 

She resists.

“I won’t kneel,” Riven manages to rasp, tilting her chin up proudly despite everything...perhaps _because_ of everything. “Not for...for…”

She throws a gesture with one hand, and it takes in the whole of Katarina’s room, from the emptied Noxian wine to the Du Couteau coat of arms above the door.  She is not part of that world anymore, and she cannot go back.  Not anymore.

To her surprise, Katarina nods once, slowly. “True...you will never bow before Noxus again.  Not ever.”

Her green eyes are measuring, knowing, but neither upset nor offended.  Then the red curve of her lips turn upward.  Her hand pincers into the tendon and nerve, and Riven’s knees strike against the floor.  Her head now hovers mere inches from from the pale contours of Katarina’s waist.

She feels her heart begin to race, and her blood pounds, though it is not from anger.  Not this time. 

“But I am not Noxus, Riven.  And before me, _you will_ _kneel_.”

**Author's Note:**

> On an important (and realistic note), one thing that I omitted from this fic (for reasons of flow and reader immersion) was the negotiation and use of a "safeword". Just remember, all, a safeword is key in heavy BDSM or especially edgeplay activities! Agree on a word beforehand to be used in case one party actually means no! //end PSA
> 
> Anyway, reviews, comments, criticism, etc are always appreciated! Thanks so much for reading!


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